Guatemala In Mourning After Blaze Kills 20 Girls In Shelter

SAN JOSI PINULA, Guatemala, March 9, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 09th Mar, 2017 ) - Guatemala declared three days of mourning after a blaze Wednesday in a government-run children's shelter killed 20 teenage girls and focusednational attention on allegations of abuse in the facilty.

All those killed were aged between 14 and 17. Most appeared to have died of burns in the fire that occurred in the Virgin of the Assumption Safe Home in San Jose Pinula, 10 kilometers (six miles) east of Guatemala City, officials said.

Dozens of survivors were treated for serious burns in several of the capital's hospitals. One, Roosevelt Hospital, said it had 24 wounded, six of them in critical condition. The blaze was believed to have started during an overnight rebellion in the packed center, which holds nearly double the 400 people it was designed to house.

"They were serving food to the teenagers when some of them started a fire in a mattress and that's how the fire was set," said Abner Paredes, a prosecutor defending children's rights. "It was a ticking time bomb.

This was to be expected," one of the center's former employees, Angel Cardenas, said outside. He said he had lodged several warnings about conditions inside. At the entrance of the facility -- whose imposing, barbed wire-topped concrete wall showed no sign of the drama inside -- crying relatives crowded the entrance.

They were searching for news of the children kept there.

Police blocked access to them and to journalists. She said many frustrated people had gone to the hospitals to see if their relatives were there.

Aguirre said she, too, had lodged past complaints about how the center's charges were treated, but received no attention. She said brawls broke out inside often, and her brother was sometimes put in a dark isolation cell nicknamed the "chicken coop." She said she had tried in vain to be given custody of her siblings after their mother's death four months ago.

Guatemalan media said the shelters' occupants had revolted overnight and into Wednesday against alleged sexual abuse by staff, and over poor food and conditions. The United Nations children's fund UNICEF called the fire and the deaths a "tragedy." It added in a Twitter post that "these children and adolescents must be protected." The center, supervised by state authorities, hosts minors under age 18 who are victims of domestic violence or found living on the street.

They are sent there by court order and are under the responsibility of the social welfare ministry. The shelter has been the target of multiple complaints alleging abuse. Dozens of children have run away in the past year, reportedly to escape ill treatment inside. Reports that could not be verified said that dozens of residents had attempted to flee the facility late Tuesday.